The Sanguinor

[Leonaides]

He might well work in a 1k list, but you're unliklely to come up against anything that he's particualarly useful against in a 1k list that something else in your army cant fight against better and for less points. And 1k lists are all about getting the most bang for your buck.

[Lucumon]

Mephiston would be a better choice if you wanted a big thing for two reasons: (1) The Sanguinor excels at buffing and debuffing. At 1,000 points, there isnt much to buff. (this is subjective as if you wanted him to just buff the DC or somesuch, it could work) and (2) If you wanted a giant beat stick in a game where there is little that can hurt him, Mephiston wins in what he can kill.

[Aarkon]

Mephiston would be a better choice if you wanted a big thing for two reasons: (1) The Sanguinor excels at buffing and debuffing. At 1,000 points, there isnt much to buff. (this is subjective as if you wanted him to just buff the DC or somesuch, it could work) and (2) If you wanted a giant beat stick in a game where there is little that can hurt him, Mephiston wins in what he can kill.

 

 

I beg to differ actually. Mephiston is only a good beat stick if you are playing against a player who doesn't know enough about him. If you play players who know about Mephistion they will rapid fire some plasma at him and he dies, Drop podding Sternguard will take Mephiston out without any trouble. Sanginor is way better. Two weeks ago I did run a 2000pt tournament list with both of them in the list as well as 10 Assault Terminators LOL. This list was fun and did get me best general at the tournament. But easily Sanginor is better for a few reasons, first if in a battle you don't get either Mephiston or Sanguinar into combat Sang at least boosts your army. Hell, your opponent will cry when the Blessing hits your Thunder Hammer Terminator sargent. Also Mephiston is a beast but with the armies I see running these days the psychic defense tends to shut Mephiston down. Shadow of the Warp, Space Wolf Rune Priests and Runes of Warding make baby Mephiston cry. Though none of those things bother Sanguinor. Sanguinor will take out Abbadon, Mephiston will not. I have played lots of games trying both on their own and by themselves, and I will always pay the extra points for Sanguinor every time. It is like playing Chaos, you always pay the extra points for Abbadon over Typhus.

 

Mephiston is a good thing to shock opponents because more people fear Mephiston but honestly the players in my area now know to fear Sanguinor more.

[Crynn]

Mephiston would be a better choice if you wanted a big thing for two reasons: (1) The Sanguinor excels at buffing and debuffing. At 1,000 points, there isnt much to buff. (this is subjective as if you wanted him to just buff the DC or somesuch, it could work) and (2) If you wanted a giant beat stick in a game where there is little that can hurt him, Mephiston wins in what he can kill.

 

 

I beg to differ actually. Mephiston is only a good beat stick if you are playing against a player who doesn't know enough about him. If you play players who know about Mephistion they will rapid fire some plasma at him and he dies, Drop podding Sternguard will take Mephiston out without any trouble. Sanginor is way better. Two weeks ago I did run a 2000pt tournament list with both of them in the list as well as 10 Assault Terminators LOL. This list was fun and did get me best general at the tournament. But easily Sanginor is better for a few reasons, first if in a battle you don't get either Mephiston or Sanguinar into combat Sang at least boosts your army. Hell, your opponent will cry when the Blessing hits your Thunder Hammer Terminator sargent. Also Mephiston is a beast but with the armies I see running these days the psychic defense tends to shut Mephiston down. Shadow of the Warp, Space Wolf Rune Priests and Runes of Warding make baby Mephiston cry. Though none of those things bother Sanguinor. Sanguinor will take out Abbadon, Mephiston will not. I have played lots of games trying both on their own and by themselves, and I will always pay the extra points for Sanguinor every time. It is like playing Chaos, you always pay the extra points for Abbadon over Typhus.

 

Mephiston is a good thing to shock opponents because more people fear Mephiston but honestly the players in my area now know to fear Sanguinor more.

 

 

Let me just start with this. I like the sanguinor, I actually think he's quite a good character but.......

 

The quote above is clearly written from a novice BA and Mephiston player. There are some opinions I disagree with and that is fine, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. But then there are some mathamatical errors where you are just plane wrong.

 

Mephiston will not die to drop poddong sternguard, the sanguinor is much more likely too with the 2+ to wound rounds. Lets say there are ten and they all have combi plasmas which never happens, any decent player uses combi meltas. Then lets presume you have been too stupid to put Meph behind a vehicle and or surrounded him in some way with cover and or your other forces and have actually given your opponent room for 10 sternguard to pod in rapid fire range of meph. So presuming your generalmanship is this bad, in which case the game is already lost, even if Meph just gets cover and they launch this 350pt mega squad at you they get this. 20 plasma shots killing one of their own marines hitting 66% of the time then wounding 44% of the time and with a cover save its down to 22% chance for a wound. There are 20 shots totalling 4.4 wounds. so on average meph will actually live and if you left meph completely out in the open with no cover then just dont use meph hes obviously requires some thinking to use which this type of person is not capable of.

Now the sanguinor. same deal with the sternguard, 66% to hit down to 55% to wound and a 3++ save brings it too 18.3% times 20 shots = 3.66 wounds so on average the sanguinor dies. not to mention hes bigger and will get shot more than meph.

 

Then there is the sanguinors buff +1 attack is great and he has some good abilities but as for your "opponent will cry when it hits your terminator sargant" he will also laugh when it hits yout tac or assault marine sarg. which is more likely even in your army with 2 termie squads do u have 3 maybe for troop choices? the odds aren't in your favor.

 

Then there is psychic defence. You do realize that against tyranids regardless of shadowns of the warp meph will obliterate tyranid creatures so much faster than the sanguinor. You have 3 or 2 if you use wings chances to use your force weapon. Whats the sang going to do? If its a hive tyrant he still wont kill it as quickly as meph and if it isnt a hq he will do almost nothing even on charge. will hit 5 times cause 1.7 wounds. Meph will hit 4 times cause 2 wounds more if in FC bubble range then get 2-3 chances to ID the creature so against nids Meph wins not to mention his psychic hood will help null their psychic attacks which can be very pottent.

Next a space wolves eldar and all your other psychic defence. hoods have a 40% success rate SW ones 50% but with three casts it doesnt matter so much eldar are more annoying but wait for it. all of this psychic defences comes from wait wait PSYCHERS. so Mephistons psychic hood is a pain to them too, the Sang does nothing to stop doom guide blade storm avengers, Meph does, what about wolves with all your jump troops count as moving into difficult and dangerous terrain with one spell? Not only that with str and toughness 6 and fleet half of the time he doesnt need to use his powers. Not to mention he cant get locked in combat by a walker like a dread or wraithlord like the sang who is then doomed.

 

Another small thing meph has a BS 5 plasma pistol which is a dead terminator on the average shot or if your lucky a quick shot at a transport, the sang has no ranged attack. Look at it this way. Before combat meph gets an additional st7 power weapon attack that always hits on a 2+ and strikes before combat starts. It's worth 15 points in a codex.

 

And now for your next mathamatical blunder. Meph doesn't kill Abaddon? Do you just make numbers up or do you live in your own world? not counting Mephs plasma shot and keeping strictly further advanaging the sanguinor.

Meph will charge go str 10 Abaddon on average will fail his LD test and then this happens, meph 6 attacks. has a 75% chance to hit thanks to rerolls. a whopping 97% chance to wound out of that bringing it down to slightly more than 73% chance to wound then abaddon saves bringing it down too 36.5% chance to wound. 36.5 x 6 = 2.2 wounds. Abaddon strikes back averages 6.6 attacks. hitting 50% and wounding 49% = 3.26 wounds on meph.

Round two same thing happens meph with only with Meph having 5 attacks and the math works out at 1.82 wounds total being 4.2 wounds killing abbaddon and leaving meph with on average 2 wounds.

The sanguinor will with Abaddon as elected opponent hit 88% of the time and on the charge wound 78.3% of the time abddon saves bringing it down to 38.7 with 6 attacks = 2.34 wounds abaddon strikes back same math as before however th 3.2 wounds gets knocked to 1.1 wound via the sangs save. next turn the sang attacks again this time wounding less due to no FC this time causeine 88% hits then down to 66% chance to wound then 33% with abaddon save x5 for the sangs attacks = 1.65 + 2.34 = 3.99 so abaddon is pretty much dead but not before he strikes back inflicting another 1.1 wounds on the sanguinor leaving him on 1 wound. This means that Meph is slightly more likely to beat Abaddon without dying to him than the Sanguinor as it is slightly more likely for the sanguinor not to kill Abaddon in the second round. On a side not Mephiston will also beat the sanguinor 1v1 as well. So you have learned something.

 

1 More point after all this abaddon bashing. Once the Sang has gone and killed Abaddon his ability to dmg is greatly nerfed no more re-rolls to hit bar the 1 from his glaive or 2 wound while meph i still able to dish out 6 str 10 attacks at I7 with rerolls to hit. Mephs usefullness continues the Sanguinor suddenly becomes less potent.

 

I could have just said this at the start and saved myself all this typing but, Mephiston sees competitive play, The Sanguinor doesn't, it's that simple. With a compitent general Mephiston is a all round better charactor and for less. I still typed all this though so you could understand what is going wrong and why you may not be finding meph so succesful. He cannot be just thrown out into the open like the Sanguinor. Use cover or make your own, I'll leave you with that.

 

Regards

 

Crynn

[Mezkh]

Lots of words ;)

 

And then two assault squads pile in, getting +20 attacks from the Sanguinor.

 

Why don't you run both Characters? :thanks:

[Khavos]

I could have just said this at the start and saved myself all this typing but, Mephiston sees competitive play, The Sanguinor doesn't, it's that simple.

 

Because herd mentality is always the final arbiter of what's effective and what's not, right?

[Erasmus of Baal]

The way I see things, it's all about how you want to use him. If you want him to be a Hero-killer, Mephiston is the obvious choice, as Crynn pointed out. On the other hand, though, I usually want my regular squads capable of combating these to some effectiveness; I prefer my HQs to support a squad that they're designed in the list to work with. As such, I'll probably end up using the Sanguinor a lot once I finally get the model.

 

TL;DR: Neither is definably better overall, they have different uses.

[Israfel]

Sanguinor is too expensive to play only as a support character, he must also get into the fight in order to get his points back.

[Erasmus of Baal]

Sanguinor is too expensive to play only as a support character, he must also get into the fight in order to get his points back.

 

which is why I would advocate playing him in an assault squad, preferably something powerful like a Sanguinary Guard squad, so that you can get both out of him. Just because he can't join doesn't mean that he can't work closely with them like a usual IC.

[Lucumon]

I could have just said this at the start and saved myself all this typing but, Mephiston sees competitive play, The Sanguinor doesn't, it's that simple.

 

Because herd mentality is always the final arbiter of what's effective and what's not, right?

 

Actually, yes. The 'Wisdom of Crowds' is well-established... independent thinkers often come to similar conclusions after reviewing the same set of information.

 

Failures? Sure, look at stock markets (the crown jewel of herd mentality). To look at a crisis in that narrow time frame will always show blemishes. Now look at the world economy over the last 100 years... I would think the conclusion is that these same markets have been more of a blessing than a curse. I am sure you could 'what if' any scenario to fit your view... but we should be more concerned with the most of the time when dealing with unknowns, shouldnt we? If you spend all your points on the unlikely, you will be unprepared for the likely.

 

The herd mentality of seeing Mephiston in competitive play could be judged based on how those armies do... but still a valid point in proving that Mephiston is a better choice than the Sanguinor in that context.

[Brother Nathan]

its quite harsh to say that someone whos mephy gets on the wrong end of sternguard is a bad general. its kinda hard for mephy to hide from such a squad behind a rhino when such a squad usually uses a droppod... and general marines fear mehyson more than say wolves or guard so are more likely to do this than other armys, because they can whilst others cant ( well wolves want to and can try but are better at other areas than rapid firing plasma...

[Aarkon]

Let me just start with this. I like the sanguinor, I actually think he's quite a good character but.......

 

The quote above is clearly written from a novice BA and Mephiston player. There are some opinions I disagree with and that is fine, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. But then there are some mathamatical errors where you are just plane wrong.

 

Mephiston will not die to drop poddong sternguard, the sanguinor is much more likely too with the 2+ to wound rounds. Lets say there are ten and they all have combi plasmas which never happens, any decent player uses combi meltas. Then lets presume you have been too stupid to put Meph behind a vehicle and or surrounded him in some way with cover and or your other forces and have actually given your opponent room for 10 sternguard to pod in rapid fire range of meph. So presuming your generalmanship is this bad, in which case the game is already lost, even if Meph just gets cover and they launch this 350pt mega squad at you they get this. 20 plasma shots killing one of their own marines hitting 66% of the time then wounding 44% of the time and with a cover save its down to 22% chance for a wound. There are 20 shots totalling 4.4 wounds. so on average meph will actually live and if you left meph completely out in the open with no cover then just dont use meph hes obviously requires some thinking to use which this type of person is not capable of.

Now the sanguinor. same deal with the sternguard, 66% to hit down to 55% to wound and a 3++ save brings it too 18.3% times 20 shots = 3.66 wounds so on average the sanguinor dies. not to mention hes bigger and will get shot more than meph.

 

Actually you talk about leaving Mephiston out in the open, I find this happens more often when you Assault with him, win and roll low and are unable to get him back into cover. I usually run him behind tanks and into cover any time I can, however this is just not always possible and it would actually only take 5 Sternguard with Meltas to put 4 or 5 wounds on Mephiston without trouble. The last game I played where my opponent had Mephiston, I found 3 dropping Oblits with rapid fire plasma worked just fine to kill him. You do mention 20 plasma would hit 66% of the time which I agree with, thats 13.2 hits and they wound on a 3+ which again would be 66% would it not? Not 44%? That would be 8.7 wounds, or 9 wounds and his cover save would save 50% on the 4+ means he would save 5 wounds if he is lucky meaning he would take 4 wonds, or he would save 4 wounds and would then take 5 and die. Maybe I am missing something in my math which is entirely possible.

 

Then there is the sanguinors buff +1 attack is great and he has some good abilities but as for your "opponent will cry when it hits your terminator sargant" he will also laugh when it hits yout tac or assault marine sarg. which is more likely even in your army with 2 termie squads do u have 3 maybe for troop choices? the odds aren't in your favor.

 

Actually he only laughs till that Assault Sarg with his WS5 charges and hits on 3+ with his 4 attacks on the charge. I love it when he buffs my Terminator Sagrent but anyone he buffs is good. I never take Tact squads, so yes maybe if I ran one that wouldn't be as useful a buff I guess. In my games which is all I can really go on, no matter who he buffs in my armies it is a boon. I don't bank on my army HAVING to have the Terminator buffed, it is good when it happens but I don't hindge the army on that.

 

Then there is psychic defence. You do realize that against tyranids regardless of shadowns of the warp meph will obliterate tyranid creatures so much faster than the sanguinor. You have 3 or 2 if you use wings chances to use your force weapon. Whats the sang going to do? If its a hive tyrant he still wont kill it as quickly as meph and if it isnt a hq he will do almost nothing even on charge. will hit 5 times cause 1.7 wounds. Meph will hit 4 times cause 2 wounds more if in FC bubble range then get 2-3 chances to ID the creature so against nids Meph wins not to mention his psychic hood will help null their psychic attacks which can be very pottent.

 

I do realize that Mephiston is more useful if you are playing Nids, however if he gets hit with that nerf beam and is not able to stop that, putting him at WS 1 and I 1 means Poison Gaunts have a chance to pull him down, not to mention some of the big nasties. Now if you told me for sure I am playing Nids I would definatly take Mephiston over Sanguinor every time sure, in a tournament however out of 4 games that we play in our local area, I might see one Nid player our of every 8 or so games, so again in my experience Sanguinor pays off more often then not.

 

Next a space wolves eldar and all your other psychic defence. hoods have a 40% success rate SW ones 50% but with three casts it doesnt matter so much eldar are more annoying but wait for it. all of this psychic defences comes from wait wait PSYCHERS. so Mephistons psychic hood is a pain to them too, the Sang does nothing to stop doom guide blade storm avengers, Meph does, what about wolves with all your jump troops count as moving into difficult and dangerous terrain with one spell? Not only that with str and toughness 6 and fleet half of the time he doesnt need to use his powers. Not to mention he cant get locked in combat by a walker like a dread or wraithlord like the sang who is then doomed.

 

Actually the Eldar runes are table wide which means they don't need to be within 24" of Mephiston to stop him, however he has to get to within 24" of them to have a 50% chance to stop them. But yes Sanguinor can't stop them at all. Though I run a Mech Eldar list and would just hope that neither Mephiston or Sangunior would hit my lines to be honest lol. The Sanguinor can move 13" to 18" a turn if a Walker or Wraithlord catches him I think the player playing Sanguinor made a mistake some where. But yes Mephiston with Str 6 has a better chance then Sang with his Str 5. In that case.

 

Another small thing meph has a BS 5 plasma pistol which is a dead terminator on the average shot or if your lucky a quick shot at a transport, the sang has no ranged attack. Look at it this way. Before combat meph gets an additional st7 power weapon attack that always hits on a 2+ and strikes before combat starts. It's worth 15 points in a codex.

 

Granted, and 16% of the time Mephsiton hurts himself with his pistol lol. This happens way more often then not when I use him.

 

And now for your next mathamatical blunder. Meph doesn't kill Abaddon? Do you just make numbers up or do you live in your own world? not counting Mephs plasma shot and keeping strictly further advanaging the sanguinor.

Meph will charge go str 10 Abaddon on average will fail his LD test and then this happens, meph 6 attacks. has a 75% chance to hit thanks to rerolls. a whopping 97% chance to wound out of that bringing it down to slightly more than 73% chance to wound then abaddon saves bringing it down too 36.5% chance to wound. 36.5 x 6 = 2.2 wounds. Abaddon strikes back averages 6.6 attacks. hitting 50% and wounding 49% = 3.26 wounds on meph.

Round two same thing happens meph with only with Meph having 5 attacks and the math works out at 1.82 wounds total being 4.2 wounds killing abbaddon and leaving meph with on average 2 wounds.

 

You mention that Abbadon strikes back on average 6.6 attacks. He gets 4 attacks standing still and will roll on average either a 3 or a 4 which is actually either 7 attakcs or 8 attakcs so it is somewhere higher then 6.6 attacks. I mean the least attacks he can have is 6 the most is 10 so the average would actually be 8 attacks, not 6.6 with 16% of the time not attacking at all. *shrug*

 

The sanguinor will with Abaddon as elected opponent hit 88% of the time and on the charge wound 78.3% of the time abddon saves bringing it down to 38.7 with 6 attacks = 2.34 wounds abaddon strikes back same math as before however th 3.2 wounds gets knocked to 1.1 wound via the sangs save. next turn the sang attacks again this time wounding less due to no FC this time causeine 88% hits then down to 66% chance to wound then 33% with abaddon save x5 for the sangs attacks = 1.65 + 2.34 = 3.99 so abaddon is pretty much dead but not before he strikes back inflicting another 1.1 wounds on the sanguinor leaving him on 1 wound. This means that Meph is slightly more likely to beat Abaddon without dying to him than the Sanguinor as it is slightly more likely for the sanguinor not to kill Abaddon in the second round. On a side note Mephiston will also beat the sanguinor 1v1 as well. So you have learned something.

 

Always good to learn something, I have taken both against Abbadon quite a few times, Sangunior walks away, Mephiston has yet to walk away from the match up, so going with just what I have seen, more often then not Sanguinor comes out of the fight, in my experience which again is all I can go on really.

 

1 More point after all this abaddon bashing. Once the Sang has gone and killed Abaddon his ability to dmg is greatly nerfed no more re-rolls to hit bar the 1 from his glaive or 2 wound while meph i still able to dish out 6 str 10 attacks at I7 with rerolls to hit. Mephs usefullness continues the Sanguinor suddenly becomes less potent.

 

I could have just said this at the start and saved myself all this typing but, Mephiston sees competitive play, The Sanguinor doesn't, it's that simple. With a compitent general Mephiston is a all round better charactor and for less. I still typed all this though so you could understand what is going wrong and why you may not be finding meph so succesful. He cannot be just thrown out into the open like the Sanguinor. Use cover or make your own, I'll leave you with that.

 

Regards

 

Crynn

 

In our area even in the big events like the Warmaster Event that had 104 players in the doubles and 70+ players in the single events You saw the Sangruinor more then Mephiston *shrug* it can also be the meta-game in diffrent areas, I find in our area when I take Mephiston he dies quickly. Now in my list thats what I use him for because he is a HELL of a bullet magnet. I find one of the things that makes the Sanguinor more helpful for me is people are usually terrified by Mephiston (again this mostly comes from them reading things on the net). So more often then not people will leave Sanguinor alone and gun for Mephiston.